Friday, May 30, 2008

About 4-5 years ago, one of the "maali" who roam around on cycles selling plants and little saplings, sold me a pot of lily saying bright red lilies with bloom from the plant. Since it was for Rs. 20.00 I didn't think much and bought it. And all these years it just bloomed leaves, leaves and some more leaves. There was no sight of a flower or even a bud but I still liked the lush green leaves of the plant and didn't exchange it with the maali even though I bought many more plants from him over the years. I could have, saying it is not blooming as he had promised, like I did with some other plants but somehow I just didn't want to.

Since this week it has started blooming. Blooming white lilies. The day I saw them I was so ecstatic. As my memory of these lilies is from my Nana-Nani's house. That's where I saw them first and that was the last too. I never saw these lilies again till this week. And I'm so happy that they are blooming right in my house!!

It feels like that something that had gotten lost has come back! Is it a sign? I don't know. Maybe I'm thinking too much into it. Anyhow, that is the picture of it which I just couldn't resist sharing it with you all!

Thursday, May 29, 2008

Almost about an year ago I wrote about the dilemma of having a second child or not. And early this year, somehow me and DH decided that we shall not have another child. We discussed and talked for long before arriving at this decision. With both of us working, we are giving practically next to no time to Anirudh during weekdays. And having another child meant further division of such measly time between the two of them. Which we both felt was not a wise idea.

The option of me staying back home was ruled out completely looking at how irritated and frustrated I felt when I was home for 4-5 months last year. I had initially thought that I would make good use of this break from work but I realised I'm not cut out for being a home maker. House chores bore me way too much! I wanted to get back to work ASAP. I wanted to go out of the house and feel contented when I would step back into the house again. Well, there were days when I would feel happy after coming back home but that was only after a shopping spree :D

There were days when I would be all happy and chirpy in the morning when I would wake up but the moment I would see hubby and Betu leave for office and school respectively, I would start feeling depressed. My moods kept going through this off and on phase for months altogether. And I guess Betu and hubby had to bear the brunt of that. Sorry guys! It was not intentional.

Besides work related stuff, we both felt that I was losing my patience over little little things that Anirudh would do. And if we thought of having another baby, patience would be the first thing that I would definitely need to have.

So after looking and discussing every aspect, we both decided against the second child idea. After lingering on the thoughts for another few weeks finally I decided and gave away all of betu's old clothes away. Some to the child of the guard at his school/daycare and some to an NGO called Goonj which works with and for the poor and the deprived.

Once I had given away the stuff I felt kind of relieved. Partly because I had finally reached a decision and partly because I had less clutter at the house now :)

But why am I talking about all these things which happened more than 4 months ago? Because of an incident that happened last week, a feeling that I went through because of that incident. A thought that crossed my mind and hubby's too when I told him about my feelings. I saw Betu walking towards the house along with his dad last week from a distance. And I kind of felt a sudden lump in my throat. Because my baby did not seem like a baby anymore. He was looking like such a big boy. A really grown up boy. And damn, I missed the baby factor in him. And I thought to myself, we need to get another baby in the house :)

I spoke to hubby again that night about the second child and he agreed that there are times when he wants to have another baby too! In fact about 2 months ago even Betu had shown the desire of having a little baby in the house which will stay with us and not go away as he had seen with little babies visiting us. He would be so so heart broken whenever they would go back with their parents. He would cry and plead for them to stay back with us. And despite us trying to tell him that the baby needs to go back with his/her parents like he stays with his, he just would not listen to us and continue to wail.

So now again we are in a dilemma about the second child. However, there is a difference from the last time. Last time the dilemma was to have a second child or not. But this time we know we SHALL have a second child and the dilemma is WHEN?

Since I've recently gotten back to job, I know I don't want to get pregnant for another 5-6 months. Plus I joke with hubby that my expiry date is nearing, since I'm going to be 33 this year, so we need to decide fast :D

Friday, May 23, 2008

...I envy them coz they can tuck in their T-shirts/shirts in their trousers/jeans/pants and not feel conscious at all of their bulging bellies.

...They ughh me for peeing in the public and not feel embarrassed about it

...I wonder how can they be so nonchalant about a messy house/room/loo and be happy with it.

...Make me angry when they would cross over a piece of paper/toy/cloth/trash lying on the floor or in the middle of the room umpteen times but would never even think of picking it up and putting it where it is supposed to be.

...Irritate me when they come up with tonnes of suggestions on how things should be done but may have never done so themselves or will never do in future as well.

...Make me mad when they ask "What were you doing the whole day?" when something they had asked for is not done even if we have been busy taking are of the house/kids/work.

...How can they be engrossed in something that they cannot hear a child saying 'Papa' 'Papa' over 10 times standing right next to them.

Tuesday, May 20, 2008

I came across this article totally and it kind of left me zapped. If its really true, its something that we should not only ponder but do something about it.

The article said, after a study made on more than 13000 children, it was found that if the mothers used mobile phones during pregnancy - more than 3-4 times a day, their kids were 54% more likely to be hyperactive and have behavioral problems than those who did not use the mobiles as much.

During my pregnancy I had used the mobile definitely much more than the said 3-4 times in a day. And I wonder if after knowing this we will be able to restrict the usage. Its the amongst the most used things in the everyday life of us.

Here is the article copied and pasted from the source:

Warning: Using a mobile phone while pregnant can seriously damage your baby

Study of 13,000 children exposes link between use of handsets and later behavioural problems

By Geoffrey Lean, Environment EditorSunday, 18 May 2008

Women who use mobile phones when pregnant are more likely to give birth to children with behavioural problems, according to authoritative research.

A giant study, which surveyed more than 13,000 children, found that using the handsets just two or three times a day was enough to raise the risk of their babies developing hyperactivity and difficulties with conduct, emotions and relationships by the time they reached school age. And it adds that the likelihood is even greater if the children themselves used the phones before the age of seven.

The results of the study, the first of its kind, have taken the top scientists who conducted it by surprise. But they follow warnings against both pregnant women and children using mobiles by the official Russian radiation watchdog body, which believes that the peril they pose "is not much lower than the risk to children's health from tobacco or alcohol".

The research – at the universities of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) and Aarhus, Denmark – is to be published in the July issue of the journal Epidemiology and will carry particular weight because one of its authors has been sceptical that mobile phones pose a risk to health.

UCLA's Professor Leeka Kheifets – who serves on a key committee of the International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection, the body that sets the guidelines for exposure to mobile phones – wrote three and a half years ago that the results of studies on people who used them "to date give no consistent evidence of a causal relationship between exposure to radiofrequency fields and any adverse health effect".

The scientists questioned the mothers of 13,159 children born in Denmark in the late 1990s about their use of the phones in pregnancy, and their children's use of them and behaviour up to the age of seven. As they gave birth before mobiles became universal, about half of the mothers had used them infrequently or not at all, enabling comparisons to be made.

They found that mothers who did use the handsets were 54 per cent more likely to have children with behavioural problems and that the likelihood increased with the amount of potential exposure to the radiation. And when the children also later used the phones they were, overall, 80 per cent more likely to suffer from difficulties with behaviour. They were 25 per cent more at risk from emotional problems, 34 per cent more likely to suffer from difficulties relating to their peers, 35 per cent more likely to be hyperactive, and 49 per cent more prone to problems with conduct.

The scientists say that the results were "unexpected", and that they knew of no biological mechanisms that could cause them. But when they tried to explain them by accounting for other possible causes – such as smoking during pregnancy, family psychiatric history or socio-economic status – they found that, far from disappearing, the association with mobile phone use got even stronger.

They add that there might be other possible explanations that they did not examine – such as that mothers who used the phones frequently might pay less attention to their children – and stress that the results "should be interpreted with caution" and checked by further studies. But they conclude that "if they are real they would have major public health implications".

Professor Sam Milham, of the blue-chip Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York, and the University of Washington School of Public Health – one of the pioneers of research in the field – said last week that he had no doubt that the results were real. He pointed out that recent Canadian research on pregnant rats exposed to similar radiation had found structural changes in their offspring's brains.

The Russian National Committee on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection says that use of the phones by both pregnant women and children should be "limited". It concludes that children who talk on the handsets are likely to suffer from "disruption of memory, decline of attention, diminishing learning and cognitive abilities, increased irritability" in the short term, and that longer-term hazards include "depressive syndrome" and "degeneration of the nervous structures of the brain".

Monday, May 19, 2008

Its just 10:30 pm and I just cannot sleep. I had a bad headache in the afternoon and it got better after I had my dinner. Everyone is asleep but me. And lying alone in the bed I have been thinking about tonnes of things.

And as I was busy in my thoughts I got a comment on the previous post about the parents forgetting about their 23 month young boy. And then I drifted away to some incidents when we could not find Anirudh for couple of minutes.

One incident I have posted in the previous post. Similar incident had happened this year again in a wedding . One moment he was standing next to me while I was talking to someone and the next moment he was gone. It took us about 5 minutes to trace him. On asking where had he gone off he replied "main to bas paani peene gaya tha".

Another incident similar to this happened during our Udaipur trip. Betu wanted to use the loo. I took him to the ladies loo but there was a long queue. I waited for his dad to come where we were. After a while betu said he cannot hold on so I made him sit on the scooter and walked away about 20 steps away from him to call his dad so that he can take betu to the gents loo. And when I turned back he was gone. It took is some 5-7 minutes to trace him. Me and hubby bothI were quite scared since the place was so crowded with tourists.

I know this was a mistake on my part and can be called sheer carelessness when we know he has this habit of walking away just like that.

And then I felt I was no different than these parents. So am I right to judge them so negatively? I guess not.

I read a news article today where the parents forgot their toddler at the airport and did not realise their mistake until they were contacted by the airport authority. And I wondered "Aisa kaise ho sakta hai? Aisa sirf movies mein hota hai!" (How can this be. This happens only in movies)

But no one can deny that this actually happened. I still cannot get myself to understand how can this be possible? How can a parent forget about a child, their own child and not for a minute of two but for full 4-5 hours!!??

How can they just assume and not check on the spouse even if they thought the kids was with him/her? I am not trying to say that I'm the best and the most careful parent here but at least we are always conscious of the fact as to who Betu is with. And even if we know we keep checking to confirm that Betu is with either of us or whoever he was with.

I remember once when we had gone to out of town for a wedding around this time of the year and we left him with our relatives to get our dinner. And when we say left him I mean made him sit at the dinner table with his Dadu and his bua and her kids. And when we returned with our plates to the table, he was no where to be seen. On asking where he was no one knew and everyone started to run frantically in all directions to look for him. It took us about 10 minutes to locate him and I just cannot describe what I went through in those 10 minutes. I have never left him with anyone since then, to leave him with somebody else. He has to be with me or his Papa.

I guess when you are not in the regular responsibility of a child, you tend to go into your usual mode and forget. I have done so too once with a kid of a relative so I know it can happen with anyone.

Its is a never ending debate on how should one parent a child but somehow this is the most ghastly mistake a parent can ever do in my eyes. I dread to imagine what the child must have gone through in those 4-5 hours of not finding his parents.

I remembered this date while talking about something with a friend today morning. I'm sure anyone can guess that this date must be so special to me and that's why I still remember it. Yup. It sure was special. There were 2 reasons. One, I was going to be meeting Appa after more than 6 months. Second, it was to be my first airplane ride.

I was not even 8 years old then. So you can understand my glee and the fact that I had started to memorise this date the day I came to know about it. The day, when we were going to fly to go to my Appa! To Iraq. And the date was May 12, Thursday. I would keep repeating this in my head n number of times during the day.

Ma had gotten new shoes for me and I wore them right from the morning after I got ready after my bath. They were nice maroon ballerina kind of shoes. Yes I remember them too! And I also vividly remember that I had loved them so much that after every few steps, I would wipe the soles lest they get ruined. Yeah I was that enthralled with my new shoes!

I don't remember much after from the time we got into the flight. I just remember when the food came and I saw a nice big black grape in the salad bowl. I quickly undid the poly wrap and ate it quickly. It tasted awful! Not at all like a grape. And I thought what kind of a grape that was. Only now I can guess that it might have been a black olive and not a grape. :D

My next memory is after we got down from the flight, I started to scan through the glass walls to spot Appa. And suddenly I saw my younger sister rushing towards one point and then started to jump up and down. And then I saw Appa. But obviously she was so excited that she wanted to go right through those glass walls in Appa's arms! She was just 4.5 years young that time. Almost the age that Anirudh is currently.

And then the next memory is that I was looking so awed at all those men in while cloaks with black & white chequered scarf on their heads held on with a black ring. I was quite amused with their greeting style. it seemed they were exchanging air kisses once on the right, then on the left, again on the right and then on the left. It went on for at least 6-7 times. I really found that funny.

I don't remember much after that until the next afternoon when me, Appa and Ma were lazing in the bedroom. Appa and Ma asked me to go and look for my younger sis as she had been missing for a while and we couldn't hear her. So up I went around looking for her and when I reached the room where the fridge was kept I almost shrieked. I saw her sitting on the bed with one chocolate in her hand, the fridge door was open and bits and pieces of chocolate all over the floor. I still have a crystal clear memory of that scene. I ran to the bedroom to tell Appa & Ma about it. They came and took her away. But I was quite devastated. Since she had almost eaten away or thrown away all the chocolates that Appa had gotten for us.

When I think of these memories now, I just can't help but laugh and smile remembering them.

Friday, May 16, 2008

When I made the star shaped parantha for Anriudh, everyone was raving about it. Well, the inspiration behind was 'Ma'. She used to make all these different shaped paranthas and rotis for us when we were kids. I still remember how excited we would be when we would get these shaped paranthas/rotis in our plates at dinner time. And then I think of her and realise how she thought of doing such little little things that used to make us so happy. She had no helping hand at home and she had to feed a bunch of hungry hoards comprising of 8 people! Cooking, cleaning, laundry in those washing machine-less days, teaching us and yet she felt the desire to do something extra for us.

I know I can't match up to her even one bit, but yes I try to do whatever little things she used to do, that made us so happy, with Anirudh too. And this was one little effort towards that.

I've made an 'A' alphabet roti for him once, a sun and a simple round roti with a smiley face on it. And he has loved it each time! And I love to see that twinkle in his eyes when he finds them in his dinner plate...just like us when we used to get them too!

Thursday, May 15, 2008

We had a major thunderstorm yesterday morning in Delhi. The sky went pitch dark around 10 AM with gusty winds and thrashing rains.

However, I got to see the impact in the evening only when I saw this tree broken down because of the storm. And in fact it had fallen on a fellow resident's car and it got smashed at one corner. And this fellow is a 70+ doc staying with his wife. I feel so bad about the doc to be going around at this age to get his car repaired.

This song is from "Hazaaron Khwaishein Aisi" and the moment you start listening to this song, you are taken to a different world altogether. That's how I felt. its such a beautiful song. Whether you just read the lyrics or listen to the song, whether you listen to it in the voice of Shubha Mudgal or in the voice of Swanand Kirkire - they both are just awesome.

Place all the ingredients except the mango pieces in a food processor jar fitted with the dough blade. Run the food processor for 2 minutes until the ingredients form a batter.

Blend the mango pieces into the batter and pour spoonfuls of the batter into the muffin moulds. Bake for 20 minutes.

I as usual baked them in the microwave but yes, I'm sure they will come out better in oven texture-wise.

But somehow I didn't like the flavour of Mango in the muffins. So next time I will probably put something else as a replacement to mango. Maybe oranges. I was also thinking of putting chunks of fresh pineapple in it as an option.

This is a riddle that Sue made for me on my special request! And why did I request a riddle for me? Because I was feeling left out as I did not respond on time to the request of being a part of the riddle game that few bloggers had planned as a part of an online baby shower for few of the preggie blogger moms!

She writes, does she,Of her family?Her betu who wants a car, and a pet;Although a combo of both would be the best bet.Lower case is her claim to fame,'Waltzing Matilde' having part of her name.And if you think I'm abstruse and contrary,I'll give up the game and say she loves her Blackberry.

Isn't this is so apt? Thanks Sue! I know I should have written this before but as they say "Better late than never!" :)

The love-link tag. The Love-link Tag is another of those Linky Love game where you only have to tag 10 person in one post but still there is no actual limit (you can tag more if you want!). Once tagged, you have to copy paste the link in this post, and make them grow! Do not delete any of the links and be honest to yourself! Copy paste the link in this post, and make them grow!

Monday, May 12, 2008

I have been playing with it ever since I got it! And by each passing day my love for it is growing in leaps and bounds! I can go on and on about its features and how cool it is and how wonderful the quality is! I will just give one example of its zoom and the quality of the picture, with bare minumum lighting of just one tubelight (40W), inside the house that I clicked about 20 mins ago. But before I do that let me sprinkle some anti jinx on my camera! :D

The first shot is from where I was sitting and the second one is a zoom in of the lamp shade, while sitting at the same position. Isn't it awesome?? And there was a lot more scope to do further zoom. I was able to zoom in further to the face or the hands and quality was still quite good! I'm just waiting to go around and do some more experimentation with it!

I know I became a mommy 4 years ago and this should ideally be the 4th mother's day celebration for me but well we never celebrated it. And in a way we didn't celebrate it even yesterday as well but it kind of implicitly got celebrated. But a celebration is a celebration..whatever kind it may be! So thats why it was my first.

Neither of us remembered it was mother's day first of all. In the morning Betu demanded to have muffins on finding those silicon muffin moulds that my sister had gotten for me. So I digged out my eggless microwave chocolate recipe and served them up in 10 minutes flat! So Betu and I polished them off while hubby was getting his maalish done in the other room. I did save a few for my friend who we had planned to meet for breakfast & lunch. When we reached her place, she had made preparations for making breadrolls. Ohh how yummy they were.

Once done eating, we went shopping to Lifestyle store in Great India Place mall at Noida, near Sector 18 market. And it was such a fun day! I picked up a kurta for myself and a trouser. And then suddenly we hear a girl wishing all a happy mother's day and was asking random people some questions and generally talking to them and then was giving away some token gifts.

A little while later she came to us and handed over that gift package to Betu to present to me! Betu was so excited looking at nicely gift wrapped package that he clung to it like his dear life all the time and when we reached the food court tore it open eagerly. It was a nice shoulder bag...office kinds. The label apparently said Lee Copper but then looking at the easy availability of fakes that one can't make out, I wonder how original it was! But then who cares! A free gift is a free gift! Right? :D

We had yummy food at the food court. Ate some noodles with manchurian and vegetarian hot dogs and ended it with nice delicious donuts!

So it was a well spent and a very enjoyable day spent together with family and one of my friend. And this is why I said it was my first mother's day celebration and it was unplanned! Somehow I feel such impromptu or unplanned celebrations are THE best!

Tuesday, May 6, 2008

Before you start thinking I'm beating my own trumpet feeling too proud and thus am using such adjectives for self, let me tell you that I was given this award by Swati :D

When I think of the word 'NICE' I get 3 things in my head. First thought is invariable about those coconut biscuits with sugar sprinkled on them. Well, what else do you expect from a foodie. The first and foremost thought is invariably about food :D. Second thought that comes to my mind on hearing/thinking about it is the adjective 'nice'. And third is the place in France called 'Nice'. And how can I ever forget that 'Nice' was also the nickname I used to use when I was first introduced to online chats in IRC. :)

So as you can see this word 'Nice' brings out a lot of thoughts in my mind but then let's stick to the adjective 'nice'. Since that is what Swati thinks I am. It is indeed 'nice' to hear that. And why does she think I'm 'nice'? She says I'm among the bunch of "NICE THOUGHTFUL PEOPLE". Well..well...she has added another adjective "thoughtful" here. Gee...thanks girl!

And as I accept this award, I would like to thank my Mommy, my Daddy, my Hubby, my Son, my friends, my colleagues, my maids, my... OK OK..I will stop here. I just thought that I can give a speech like all these actors and actresses give when they are given any award since this blog is my stage. :D

So now its my turn to come back to the stage and do honours to other winners of this award. Going back to the origin of this award -"This award will be awarded to those that are just nice people , good blog friends and those that inspire good feelings and inspiration! Those that care about others that are there to lend support or those that are just a positive influence in our blogging world!"

I don't know all my blogging pals and yet I know them. Know them enough through this virtual world, through their writings, through their comments to feel that they are nice at heart people. So here I pass on this award to the following fellow bloggers (in alphabetical order):

Lot of tags for sure :D Jokes apart, Shakti tagged me to tell everyone about what is in my bag. I've so many things that its going to fill up an entire page to write that out. And I won't even remember as such. To actually list down each and everything I will have to peek into my bag and see what all do I have there but I guess I won't do that and just write the things from my memory:

My sunshades

A diary

Few papers (related to work)

One cake recipe printout

One practice booklet that we got during our "Conflict Management" session

One lisptick

One lipliner

One ruffle

One SN & one TP

One comb

One pen

My wallet

My cheque books (2-3 different bank ones)

A subway flyer

2 CDs (of various installers)

My Blackberry holster

1-2 homeopathy medicines

I guess thats all I remember. So its your turn to tell what all you have in your bags right now - Swati, Ki-jaana & Emaan's Mom!

Friday, May 2, 2008

Today evening as I was talking to How do we know, she asked me when did I start my blog. And I drew a blank. I was not sure if its been a year yet or not. So I told her, approximately around a year.

But as I sat down to blog about our meeting, I remembered this conversation about the conception about my blog and thought let me check the date of my first post. And when I did, I realised I was just round the corner! Tomorrow, on May 3rd, it will be whole one year since I stepped into this blogging world...full, steady steps and posted my first post! 218 posts (219 if I include this one too!) and more than 400 if I count the number of posts in Betu's blog too!

And I get so awed and think "Really?? Me?? More than 400 posts??" and I just shake my head in disbelief! Yes, the feeling is still of a disbelief even when these numbers are right in front of my face!

But I guess I better start believing it and open those champagne bottles to celebrate the first birthday of my dear blog! OK..OK...I know its still some minutes before the clock strikes 12 but I just cant wait! :D

Happy Birthday my dear blog and hey to me too as I complete a year of being a blogger!

Its a famous saying "There is always a first time !" and it I had a "my first time" moment today - first time to meet a blogging buddy - IN PERSON! I was quite excited about the thought of meeting someone off the blogging world and when I met her, she reciprocated the exact same feeling! I met "How do we know" today evening. But hey, let me start from the beginning.

After exchanging a few emails and some phone calls, we decided on the time and venue. When I reached the destination I called her up to see where she was. She said she was nearby and walking towards Nirulas. I waited for her just outside the entrance and told her what I was wearing. And then I saw a little girl , who eemed no older than a first year college student, walking towards me with a look that said "Are you ~nm?" and when she was close enough, neither of us even asked to confirm our guesses and said "Hey! Finally we meet up!" And then we went in and sat down. I don't even remember how we started our conversation. And it somehow didn't seem we were meeting for the first time. Not to me at least. HDWK, did you?

And soon after we both ordered icecreams and sat down digging at our chikoo and anjeer icecreams. We talked about our babies and our blogs and our blog friends and our work and our family and about Delhi and about Hyderabad and ...just about everything. We were there for about 40 minutes and time just flew.

We have promised each other to meet up again soon! Especially since both our work places are so close to each other.

How do we know, I can't tell you how much fun it was to meet you! And I so want to meet your little one - Ishaan some day too!

Delicious chocolate muffins is what I and Betu had for evening snacks today! Yes..these sumptuous looking chocolate muffins! Ruchi, they are so yummy that its really hard to resist gobbling them all up!

My sister had sent this box of ready mix for chocolate muffins by Ghiradelli along with a silicone mold. The box talked about making them in oven and just because of that I had been shirking from making them for past so many months. Ruchi, I guess you will remember it more precisely when you actually sent them across.

But last to last week I tried to make half the quantity in microwave and I guess I over cooked them and thus they kept getting a little harder by time. But I still ate them all up :P

So learning from my previous experience I set the timer a little lesser and also made the batter a little more moist than the last time. And it worked!! I initially set the timer for 5 minutes but when they had been cooked for about 2 minutes I could smell a slight burning smell. So I stopped it and took them out. I inserted a knife to see if they are done and yes they were! In flat 2 minutes! And they were so soft and so yummy! They had little chocolate chips in the mixture and it it gave such a wonderful taste and texture to these muffins! Here are some pics of these yummylicious muffins!

..towards global warming..err..I mean to minimize it have so far been:

At work:

Switching off monitor when going for lunch. 30 min of saving is good..right?

Always switching off my system the end of the day when I go back home.

At home:

Switching on lights only where we are sitting.

Lesser usage of tissue. I have this REALLY bad habit of using lots of tissue!

We use not more than 1-2 hours of A/C at home at night, so no scope of reduction possible there.

General:

No switching on of car A/C during mornings when I go to drop Betu to school and to drive back to work. Its around 8:30 Am and its pretty warm but then its not scorching.

And no A/C in evenings as well when I leave office around 6 PM. Its pretty hot by then and me and Betu both end up in lots of sweat by the time we reach home but then its fine.

Its been 10 days since I have been at it and have been successful so far. Have you thought about changing some bits of your lifestyle towards this thought? If yes, what have they been? If not, think about it and watch the documentary by Al Gore "An Inconvenient Truth". I wrote about it here.

There has to be a conscious thought towards this or else it will not happen. And slowly this conscious effort will become a habit and everything will seem so easy.

Thursday, May 1, 2008

I had seen these sci-fi movies where the character in the movie could grow back the damaged or broken limb/body part during the fights with other characters. But how would you feel if you came to know that it can ACTUALLY happen now? I'm sure as shocked as I was when I read it with my jaw dropped till the floor!

Read about it here in this article which says a 69 yr old guy, who had lost half inch of his finger could grow back his entire finger, as good as new after using the so called 'pixie dust'.

Here is the article reproduced from the original location:

In every town in every part of this sprawling country you can find a faceless sprawling strip mall in which to do the shopping.

Rarely though would you expect to find a medical miracle working behind the counter of the mall's hobby shop.

The photos of his severed finger tip are pretty graphic. You can understand why doctors said he'd lost it for good.

Today though, you wouldn't know it. Mr Spievak, who is 69 years old, shows off his finger, and it's all there, tissue, nerves, nail, skin, even his finger print.

'Pixie dust'

How? Well that's the truly remarkable part. It wasn't a transplant. Mr Spievak re-grew his finger tip. He used a powder - or pixie dust as he sometimes refers to it while telling his story.

Mr Speivak's brother Alan - who was working in the field of regenerative medicine - sent him the powder.

For ten days Mr Spievak put a little on his finger.

"The second time I put it on I already could see growth. Each day it was up further. Finally it closed up and was a finger.

"It took about four weeks before it was sealed."

Now he says he has "complete feeling, complete movement."

The "pixie dust" comes from the University of Pittsburgh, though in the lab Dr Stephen Badylak prefers to call it extra cellular matrix.

Pig's bladder

The process he has been pioneering over the last few years involves scraping the cells from the lining of a pig's bladder.

The remaining tissue is then placed into acid, "cleaned" of all cells, and dried out.

It can be turned into sheets, or a powder.

It looks like a simple process, but of course the science is complex.

"There are all sorts of signals in the body," explains Dr Badylak.

"We have got signals that are good for forming scar, and others that are good for regenerating tissues.

"One way to think about these matrices is that we have taken out many of the stimuli for scar tissue formation and left those signals that were always there anyway for constructive remodelling."

In other words when the extra cellular matrix is put on a wound, scientists believe it stimulates cells in the tissue to grow rather than scar.

If they can perfect the technique, it might mean one day they could repair not just a severed finger, but severely burnt skin, or even damaged organs.

Clinical trial

They hope soon to start a clinical trial in Buenos Aires on a woman who has cancer of the oesophagus.

The normal procedure in such cases is often deadly. Doctors remove the cancerous portion and try to stretch the stomach lining up to meet the shortened oesophagus.

In the trial they will place the extra cellular matrix inside the body from where the portion of oesophagus has been removed, and hope to stimulate the cells around it to re-grow the missing portion.

So could limbs be re-grown? Dr Badylak is cautious, but believes the technology is potentially revolutionary.

"I think that within ten years that we will have strategies that will re-grow the bones, and promote the growth of functional tissue around those bones. And that is a major step towards eventually doing the entire limb."

That kind of talk has got the US military interested.

They are just about to start trials to re-grow parts of the fingers of injured soldiers.

Skin burns

They also hope the matrix might help veterans like Robert Henline re-grow burnt skin.

He was almost killed in an explosion while serving in Iraq. His four colleagues travelling with him in the army Humvee were all killed.

He suffered 35% burns to his head and upper body. His ears are almost totally gone, the skin on his head has been burnt to the bone, his face is a swollen raw mess.

So far he has undergone surgery 25 times. He reckons he has got another 30 to go.

Anything that could be done in terms of regeneration would be great he says.

"Life changing! I think I'm more scared of hospitals than I am of going back to Iraq again."

Like any developing technology there are many unknowns. There are worries about encouraging cancerous growths by using the matrix.

Doctors though believe that within the so called pixie dust lies an amazing medical discovery.

I've recently joined a newly formed food blog titled 'Healthy and Tasty" where we all are going to put in recipes, primarily for kids, that are easy to make and do not require too many ingredients or too much time.

I have already sent in 2 recipes there and my latest one was "Egg Parantha" which I find really easy to make and yummy as well.